Breast cancer drug approved for new indication.

摘要

The US FDA has extended its approval for the drug lapatinib (Tykerb~R, GlaxoSmithKline, PA, USA) to allow its use in combination with letrozole (Femara~R, Novartis AG, PA, USA) to treat postmeno-pausal women with hormone-positive and HER2-positive advanced breast cancer, for whom hormonal therapy is indicated.Lapatinib is an orally administered small-molecule tyrosine kinase inhibitor that is specific for the HER2/ErbB2 receptor. It was already approved for use in combination with capecitabine and in the treatment of advanced or metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer in women who had progressed on previous therapy that had included an anthracycline, a taxane and trastuzumab.